Tag Archives: birtherism

Donald Trump, national news, political news

Birtherism falls along racial lines

Now that some of us have raised the “racism” issue as it concerns Donald Trump’s pointed — and quite specific — criticism of African-American political foes, I want to revisit the issue of “birtherism.”

Trump made a lot of noise years ago about whether Barack Obama was qualified to run for president. He based his questions about the lie that Obama was born in Kenya. Therefore, he couldn’t run for president because, according to the U.S. Constitution, Obama wasn’t a “natural-born” citizen of America.

Obama, of course, was born in Hawaii in 1961. He said so at the outset. He finally produced a birth certificate to prove it. That wasn’t good enough for Trump and many others.

Why did Trump and others continue to foment the lie?

Uhh, let me see. Oh, I think it’s race. Obama’s father was a Kenyan. His mother was from Kansas. Dad was black; Mom was white. Get it?

Now, for the other noted “birther” case. It involves U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican who ran against Trump for the Republican Party presidential nomination in 2016.

Cruz actually was born outside the United States. He was born in Canada. His father is Cuban. His mother is an American.

Sen. Cruz was able to quell the questions with a simple — and generally accepted — interpretation of the Constitution. Since his mother is a U.S. citizen, Baby Ted became a U.S. citizen immediately upon his birth. Therefore, he qualifies as a “natural-born” citizen simply because of his mother’s citizenship.

Hey, that same logic works for the former president, too. His mother was a U.S. citizen, making him an American the moment he came into this wold. Except that wouldn’t fly in the minds of his critics … and that includes the president of the United States.

And all of that presumes he was born somewhere other than the United States! He was born in the U.S.A., but the questions continue to linger even to this day among most Americans who consider themselves to be Republicans.

Is race a factor? Hmm. I believe it is.

media news

Liar in Chief: the real enemy of the people

Of all the hypocritical utterances that have poured out of Donald J. Trump’s mouth since he became a politician, the one that continues to gall me in the extreme is his ongoing epithet that the media comprise “fake news” and are the “enemy of the people.”

The very idea that the president of the United States, one of the godfathers of the “birther” movement, would use the term “fake news” to reporters who are doing their job.

And for the president to describe the media as the “enemy of the people” is dangerous on its face, and not just to individual reporters, but to one of the bedrocks of our democratic system.

Trump and the New York Times’s publisher, A.G. Sulzberger, met recently to talk about the president’s ongoing bullying of the media. Trump tweeted out yet another irrational tirade against “fake news.”

My goodness. How in the world does this individual look at himself in the mirror?

He has lied continually. The birther movement was intended to question whether Barack Obama was born in the United States; he was, but that didn’t stop Trump from continuing the lie. Fake news? There you have it.

He lied about witnessing “thousands of Muslims cheering” the collapse of the Twin Towers on 9/11. Trump lied about Obama ordering the bugging of his campaign office in 2016. He lied about millions of illegal immigrants voting for Hillary Clinton, giving her the 3 million popular vote margin over Trump.

He lies and lies some more.

To think that this individual has the unmitigated gall, therefore, to accuse the media of promulgating “fake news.”

Just who, I must ask, is the real “enemy of the people”?

It’s someone in power who would promote the lies that we have heard repeatedly since he began seeking the nation’s highest office.

Donald Trump is the enemy of the people he was elected to lead.

national news, political news

Birtherism making an unwelcome return? No-o-o-o!

I wanted to hurl — well, almost — when I heard this little item out of Arizona.

Joe Arpaio, the former sheriff who lost a re-election bid, is now running for the Republican Party nomination for U.S. senator from Arizona. What does this clown say over the weekend?

He said if he’s elected to the Senate he’s going to renew the lie that former President Barack Obama was not qualified to serve — because he was born in Africa and not in Hawaii.

He said this about Barack Obama’s birth certificate: “No doubt about it, we have the evidence, I’m not going to go into all the details, yeah, it’s a phony document,” Arpaio told CNN’s Chris Cuomo on “Cuomo Primetime.”

Can you believe this? Neither can I!

Let’s remember that Arpaio, one of the more notorious lawmen in recent U.S. history, was convicted of defying a federal court order banning him from profiling Hispanics in an attempt to round up illegal immigrants.

So, what does Donald John Trump do? He pardons Arpaio, freeing him to run for the Senate in the race to succeed Jeff Flake, the Republican who is retiring at the end of the year.

Sigh …

The task now falls on Arizona Republicans to spare their state the prospect of having to listen to this clown beyond the primary election. Arpaio is one of several GOP candidates running in this race.

Why does this matter to a blogger way over here in Texas, a good distance from Arizona? Because if Arizona Republicans lose their minds and nominate this individual, he then becomes a serious contender for an office that writes federal laws that affect all Americans. That means me. And you. I cannot speak for others, but in no way in hell do I want this guy anywhere near the U.S. Senate.

It boggles my mind that he would consider resurrecting one of the most despicable lies ever told about a U.S. president.

political news

Birtherism: It’s back!

Political nut jobs have this annoying way of getting attention they don’t deserve.

The newest Exhibit A of this phenomenon happens to be the new Republican candidate for the U.S. senator from Arizona, the former Maricopa County sheriff and convicted (and later pardoned) felon Joe Arpaio.

The ex-sheriff says former President Obama’s birth certificate is a phony document. He doesn’t believe the 44th president was born in Hawaii. He said he has “evidence” that the president served two terms illegally. Will he produce the “evidence”? No, he said on CNN last night.

He had this exchange with Chris Cuomo:

“We have the evidence, nobody will talk about it, nobody will look at it, and anytime you want to come down or anybody we’ll be glad to show you the evidence,” Arpaio said.
Cuomo pressed Arpaio again on the topic: “So you believe that President Obama’s birth certificate is a phony?”
“No doubt about it,” Arpaio said.
Ugghh! No, double, maybe triple ugghh!
This is the guy, lest we forget, who was convicted of disobeying a federal court order that mandated he stop profiling Hispanics in his quest to find illegal immigrants. He then was pardoned by the president of the United States, the nation’s “birther in chief,” Donald John Trump Sr.
Now he wants to serve in the U.S. Senate?
Please. No!

 

national news, political news, Uncategorized

Two men, same issue, different debate

I want to revisit — I hope for the final time — this issue of presidential citizenship and eligibility.

It has returned to the public discussion yet again. U.S. Rep. John Lewis questioned the “legitimacy” of Donald Trump’s presidency; Trump fired back a nasty response. Lewis’s friends and allies say he is justified to question Trump’s standing as a legitimate president because Trump made such an issue for so many years about whether Barack Obama’s presidency was legit.

The issue with the president’s legitimacy stemmed from bogus allegations that he was born outside the United States. His father was a black Kenyan; his mother was a white American. Trump demanded for years that the president produce a birth certificate to show he was born in Hawaii, as he has said all along. Still, Trump didn’t let up … until late in the 2016 presidential campaign.

Another prominent politician also faced questions from Trump. U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas ran for the Republican presidential nomination this past year. Trump questioned whether he was eligible to run because Cruz, in fact, was born in Canada. His father is a Cuban native; his mother is an American.

Cruz’s answer to the equally bogus claim about his eligibility? He said his mother’s U.S. citizenship made him a U.S. citizen the moment he was born. U.S. law grants citizenship by birth status to anyone who’s born to U.S. citizens, no matter where the birth occurs. Cruz said his mother’s citizenship answers the question about whether he is a “natural born citizen,” as required under the U.S. Constitution for anyone seeking to run for president.

Problem solved. Yes? Not exactly.

I am puzzled about how it was that Cruz was able to settle this “birther” matter with an explanation that stuck while Obama’s assertion that he was born in Hawaii never was quite accepted by everyone.

Barack Obama and Ted Cruz both were born to American mothers. Both men were U.S. citizens the instant they came into this world. Why, then, would it even matter about Barack Obama’s place of birth if U.S. law grants him citizenship at the moment of his birth?

Would any of this disparity have anything at all to do with President Obama’s race? Hmmm?